Digital Samurai: Liquid Cool: From the Crazy Maniac Files, #2

By Austin Dragon

LIQUID COOL is Sci-Fi Meets the Detective Crime Thriller!

 

In the action-packed (and funny) cyberpunk detective series, tag along with Cruz, our sci-fi detective (and unlikely hero) with attitude in the fifty-million-plus, future supercity of Metropolis.

 

What are the Crazy Maniac Files?

 

Cruz has dealt with all kinds of criminal crazies—humans, cyborgs, robots—and even crazier clients. The supercity has a million victims and perpetrators but the LIQUID COOL Mini-Series features one "crazy maniac."

 

Cruz enters the secret deadly world of corporate espionage and warfare. Corporate soldiers, cyborg soldiers, samurai soldiers, and digital samurai. Two sinister megacorporations are locked in a final battle to destroy each other. Cruz is hired by an assassin rumored to travel through the Net to find and kill her targets. But why would THE DIGITAL SAMURAI need a detective?

 

Welcome to the high-tech, low-life world of Liquid Cool!

 

If you're a fan of cyberpunk and sci-fi action adventure or mystery, cyber-noir, or funny science fiction, the Liquid Cool series is for you! So get your laser pistol and grab your copy of DIGITAL SAMURAI now!

 

FIVE STAR REVIEWS FOR LIQUID COOL SERIES

"Lots of shooting, lots of crazy maniacs, lots of action and fun!"

"I loved this book. It takes place in the future, and what a weird future."

"A funny, intelligent (and sometimes crazy) main character…playing detective"

"Cool and Smooth."

"Digital Samurai…a badass sci-fi female!"

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Dragon
• Release date: Jul 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9781946590626

Austin Dragon

Austin Dragon is the author of over 30 books in science fiction, fantasy, and classic horror. His works include the sci-fi noir detective LIQUID COOL series, the epic fantasy FABLED QUEST CHRONICLES, the international futuristic epic AFTER EDEN Series, the classic SLEEPY HOLLOW HORRORS, and new military sci-fi PLANET TAMERS series. He is a native New Yorker but has called Los Angeles, California home for more than twenty years. Words to describe him, in no particular order: U.S. Army, English teacher, one-time resident of Paris, movie buff, Fortune 500 corporate recruiter, renaissance man, futurist, and dreamer.

Book preview

Chapter One

I'm Cruz, Private Detective

As I lay there on the bio-bed, staring at a white glossy ceiling, I thought about how much I hated hospitals. I viewed them as giant petri dishes—nasty people with their nasty germs, despite the facade of cleanliness. All I could think about was how long I’d be in my super-shower at home the moment I left the place.

I'm Cruz. The president, CEO, COO, and detective-on-the-go of the Liquid Cool Detective Agency. Besides my own detective firm, I have a wife, a kid, a classic hovervehicle, and a cool hat. But this morning I wasn’t at my office or working a case on the mean streets of Metropolis. I was stuck at Metro General.

My big, high-profile cases in my relatively short career as a licensed Metropolis private detective got all the attention from the media and public. However, it was the smaller cases that filled up most of a working street detective’s calendar.  They were every bit as dangerous as any of the big ones. I’d met many I’d call crazy maniacs—criminals and clients alike—from all walks of life, in all kinds of neighborhoods. Slimy, low-life gangster wannabes; shifty working-class Average Joes and Janes; and off-world, filthy rich tycoons. Most were ultimately forgettable. I solved the case and moved on, storing the data file away in the archives of my computer. But every so often one of those smaller cases couldn’t be forgotten.

I was born and raised in the supercity of Metropolis. Like every other resident, I complained constantly about the city but wouldn’t work anywhere else on the planet. Not even those booshy Up-Top colonies in space, the Moon or Mars could ever coax me away. I loved my city, crime aside. As a private detective, crime was what paid the bills and put food on the table for the family. I was very good at catching bad guys and solving cases. So good that more than a few people said it was like I had been born for it. Laborer to hovercar restorer to private investigator. Not the normal career path for a detective.

My beat—Metropolis—was the largest and most powerful supercity on Earth. Fifty million people stacked on top of one another in flashing superskyscrapers that reached high into the dark rainy skies, some as tall as three hundred stories. The ground was overflowing with life in constant motion. Flashing neon and video signs of a concrete jungle. In the good districts there were lots of lights—street lampposts over every corner, doorway, and building surface. The bad districts were places Average Joes stayed far away from; they were the stomping grounds of gangs, thugs, and the underworld. Good or bad, the gray masses bustled about with their glowing eye-wear under the ever-present rain. Above it all, hovercars, hovervans, hovercycles, and hovertaxis filled the sky—twenty to fifty feet up.

Metropolis was my home. My actual office was my Liquid Cool Detective Agency. But instead of being there, I was here—at Metro General—for a follow-up checkup. My last paying client, tried to kill me, but it’s okay because I sent her straight to the morgue with my omega-gun. A short detective career and I’d already dealt with killer cyborgs, killer robots, and killer clients.

THE DOCTOR FINALLY returned to the hospital room. He wasn’t the first expert I’d visited, more like the third. I still didn’t know how my late client, NeuroDancer, had mind-controlled me and so many others. We had lots of theories but nothing more. I’d had brain scans, eye scans, bio-scans, brain wave analysis, bloodwork, the works.

The doctor sat down in a single chair in the room. He had a chestnut complexion, with slicked-back silver hair with a full beard. He had my digital chart in his hand.

What’s the word, Doc?

Mr. Cruz, it’s all negative.

Nothing?

You are in perfect health.

But that isn’t the problem. The problem is that I don’t know how I was mind-controlled by this person.

Mr. Cruz, I do take issue with the term mind-controlled.

What would you call it?

I wouldn’t call it anything. We simply do not know. My theory is she used some type of external hardware, technology we’ve never seen. Something only she knew of.

I’m sure she wouldn’t want anyone to use it against her. But that’s not a concern of hers anymore.

Don’t trouble yourself about it, Mr. Cruz. You don’t need to see any more experts either. You have a clean bill of health.

Can you give me that in writing for the wife?

He chuckled. I’m sure I can manage a note.

It’s just that I don’t like loose ends, Doc.

I know how you feel. No one does, really. But it is the way of the world. Not everything has a clear resolution. A lesson that I’m sure you’ll impart to your son.

Cruz Jr.? That’s an intellectual conversation far in the future for his mother and me. He’s more interested in practicing to be a teleporting ninja.

Sounds like my son.

The doc stood from his chair and reached into his pocket. He showed me a digital card with rotating photos of a boy my son’s age. I jumped off the bio-bed to show him pictures of Cruz Jr.

My little ninja.

METRO GENERAL WASN’T the best hospital in Metropolis, but it was the largest and in the center of downtown. I didn’t need best; I needed good enough. Why get charged five times more and go out of my way in busy sky traffic to have a booshy doctor tell me the exact same thing?

The hospital’s megatower was always extremely busy. I got to the elevators and then to parking as quickly as I could. Another thing I hated about the hospital was its chaotic parking bay. It was the type of place where defensive driving training paid off. Always the most dangerous drivers were teenagers and the elderly. They would’ve been banned from all forms of hovervehicles if I were dictator of the Earth.

I drove a classic Ford Pony and I didn’t want any non-drivers near it. Bright red, sleek, high-performance, supercharged, advanced nitro-acceleration hydrogen engine, muscle-hovervehicle coupe. The sight of it made the average person gawk and the mouths of the genuine hovercar enthusiasts and collectors hang open. I’d found the shell in a junkyard when I was in middle school and in high school, I built and restored it, spare part by spare part, and had been upgrading it ever since. No one believed that I found and built such an expensive muscle hovercar from scratch, but it was true, and I drove it every day. My Pony was considered a true classic and always got me genuine offers to part with it, but one doesn’t sell a classic Ford Pony; it’s a purchase for life—like a legacy residence. My Pony had been featured (without my permission) in so many hovercar magazines that I’d lost count.

I slowly coasted out of the parking bay without revving the engine. I’d parked in valet but didn’t let the college-kid valets touch it. But they knew me and were happy to let me park myself as long as they could snap photos of it.

Before heading to my office, I decided to stop at Good Kosher in the district of Woodstock Falls. Woodstock Falls was a working-class, multi-ethnic, mostly Jewish neighborhood. Like similar working-class neighborhoods, residents and business owners fiercely kept the trash—human and otherwise—away. The reason why was simple—the residents didn’t just work here; they lived here. The bottom half of the monolith skyscrapers were the businesses and all above to the top was residential.

Good Kosher sat on Graffiti Alley, but despite the name there wasn’t a speck of graffiti anywhere ever. It was secluded and dark, and though it was a main street, had the feel of an out-of-the-way back alley where bad things were supposed to happen. But Good Kosher had a rabidly loyal client base that included all of Metropolis.

Good Kosher Market took up the entire length of the street, and that’s saying a lot, since streets were ginormous in Metropolis. Food came in three categories—processed (practically everything sold on the market), organic (supposedly the healthier alternative), and natural—or, as I’d say, straight from the dirt. I never shopped anywhere else. I didn’t eat processed and felt the whole organic" thing was nothing but a scam (by the unholy coupling of government and megacorps) to overcharge people for food. I only ate natural food, and Mr. Watts and his five sons had been serving nothing else for more than a century. It was like many generational businesses. I was a devoted customer and member of its select clientele for almost fifteen years.

As a fixture of a neighborhood for so long, popular among the local residents, employing the same workers and catering to the same clientele, it didn’t take long for everyone to feel as if they were all part of the same family. Every family had a sage—the wise, ol’ uncle or grandmother. Mr. Watts was our sage. You did your shopping first, one of his five sons rung up the order at the register, and then you spent however long chatting it up with the Good Kosher Man himself.

I didn’t know how old Mr. Watts was—he had to be in his late fifties at least—but there was nothing old about him. He had a full beard and mustache with the hair graying at the temples and the edges of his beard. Like his sons, his uniform was a khaki jumpsuit with a fully equipped utility belt, beaded strings around the neck, and a pointed Chinese bamboo hat to protect from the constant exposure of the artificial daylight ceiling lamps, which all its indoor natural plant life depended upon. The skin techs at Eye Candy, where my wife Dot worked, would be proud. He probably had the rare hats shipped directly from the Southeast Asia territories, back when they were affordable.

Good Kosher was also a secret flower shop with its own interior gardens in the back and off-limits to customers, growing a wide variety of roses, tulips, and other flowers. Watts and sons would go back into that room, with its steady rain mist falling, and handpick bouquets for customers. No one had better, if you wanted real ones and not the synthetic ones everyone else sold.

Mr. Cruz, how’s the family? Mr. Watts asked me at the register as his sons rung up my groceries.

Cruz Jr. will be as tall as your sons in no time.

They grinned.

I’m sure. How’s the detective business?

Busy and good.

And dangerous.

And fun.

And dangerous.

Don’t you know I’m famous now? You have a long-time client who’s famous.

Never was one to think much of being famous. Often it brings more problems than benefits.

It’s bringing in a lot of clients at the moment, so I’ll ride that wave to the bank.

Hopefully, you’ll be more selective in the cases you choose going forward.

Mr. Watts, it wasn’t my fault. How was I to know my client was a crazy maniac? She mind-controlled me.

Mind control?

Yes.

Sounds like an excuse to me.

It’s the facts. But I still solved the case, and dealt with the bad guys—multiple bad guys.

When I cook a meal, I never cook multiple dishes. Multitasking tends to lead to multi-problems and multi-sloppiness. One excellent meal, then move to the next.

I agree, Mr. Watts. But I didn’t know it was so many criminals at the beginning. Doesn’t matter. I solved my NeuroDancer Case, like I solved my Blade Gunner Case.

At least, you’re giving these cases better names.

I still don’t know why everyone doesn’t like my The Guy Who Scratched My Vehicle Case.

They chuckled.

TWO OF HIS SONS HELPED me to my vehicle with my ton of groceries. Half of it was diapers. We loaded up the trunk and back seat of the Pony. We exchanged our goodbyes as they pushed my hovercart back into the store while I got behind the wheel of my vehicle, and closed the door.

In Metropolis, the weather was mostly always the same: rain with a chance of rain. It started to drizzle a bit, but looking up I could see darker clouds moving in. I was glad it was an in the office day for me instead of an out on the streets soliciting new business one.

My eyes stopped on my rearview mirror. I turned my head to look out the rear window. I saw someone—a shadow, but now it was gone. I didn’t like it. I powered up and rose into the air. In moments, I was merging into the sky traffic. I did a quick glance down to the ground out the passenger window, and for a moment I thought I saw a shadowy figure again, but couldn’t be sure.

I’d been seeing shadows and silhouettes for the last week or so. Each time I couldn’t be positive whether there was actually someone there or if my mind was playing tricks on me. The doc had said I had a clean bill of health. Maybe I needed to visit a few more doctors.

Chapter Two

Punch Judy, My Cyborg Secretary

My Liquid Cool office was in Buzz Town. As far as districts went, it wasn’t the best of areas, but it wasn't the worst either, like a Free City or Mad Heights. I told everyone that the presence of Liquid Cool classed up the entire neighborhood. Though I wished all the tenants of my megatower on Circuit Circle—simply known as the Circle—shared that opinion.

Liquid Cool was on the hundredth floor. Since beginning my new career as a detective, I’d made the office into my own personal fortress, complete with additional surveillance of the parking lot, elevator, and hallway to and from the office. The cases I’d already worked on and the clients and criminals I’d already encountered told me not to do so would be suicidal. I liked a clean office; I liked a safe office. We weren’t one of those big, fancy, thousand-person detective firms taking up multiple floors. I was a one-man show with one employee.

I started the Liquid Cool Detective Agency not even three years ago, leaving my previous line as a classic hovervehicle restorer and sometime illegal hovercar racer behind. It started out as simple favor for a friend. Already I had solved some of the biggest and most dangerous cases that not even the big, fancy detective firms with their thousand agents could boast. 

My one employee had the street name of Punch Judy. When you knew she was a cyborg with two very impressive bionic arms that made sense. But she was Punch Judy even before her accident. My ex-felon, cyborg secretary was a soldier in the punk-posh gang Les Enfantes Terribles in Neo-Paris, France. She got her street name because she liked to punch people and was quite good at it. Now, she could even punch a three-hundred-pound cyborg through a steel and concrete wall—and had. She only wore sleeveless tops to show off her buff, bionic arms.

Today, PJ had short, crimson hair and a simulated mole—a dot above her lips, matching her crimson lipstick-covered lips. Hip, female business suits were what she wore nowadays—sleeveless tops, knee-high skirts, heeled leather boots. We started out as frenemies, but she was my respectable second in command these days.

I walked through the front door and was met by her French ska music playing.

Ah, you’ve decided to come to work after all, she said from behind her reception desk.

She’d turned the main office area into a shrine to all my high-profile cases. There were framed pictures covering practically every inch of the reception area. Pictures of me at press conferences, at police scenes, with megacorporation senior executives, with the Council of Corporations president, me shaking hands with the mayor, but my favorites were those with just the Average Joes and Janes of the supercity, including the client from my very first major case, Carol Num, after I successfully rescued her kidnapped daughter. These were the cases that made it all worthwhile, despite all the crazy maniacs I had to deal with and those who shot at me. I didn’t like getting shot.

Did the doctors say you’re cuckoo?

No, I am in perfect health, top to bottom, in and out, mind and body.

So they don’t know what made you cuckoo?

I’m fine. Since she’s dead and she’s the only one who knew how to do her mind-control trick, I’m not too concerned.

If you say so. You have many messages on your desk. You need to review them first.

I can’t drink a cup of coffee?

No, you were late to work so straight to working. No coffee.

I laughed.

PJ’s reception desk was a workstation behind a metal barrier, but it didn’t look like a barrier with all her decorations. Psychedelic posters filled the wall behind her, her fancy glass desk had see-through glass drawers, and her boombox sat on top along with her own mobile computer.

About eight feet from her was the door to my private office. On the wall outside of it was her neon light sign in big letters:  LIQUID COOL. Underneath, in smaller neon letters, DETECTIVE AGENCY.

Her vid-phone rang. Hello, this is Liquid Cool. Why are you calling?

I stopped next to her desk. Please tell me that’s not how you’re answering our phones.

Why are you calling me? PJ asked whoever she was talking to. I’m not your secretary. Call him directly.

Whoever it was couldn’t even get a word out.

Bye!

She hung up on whoever it was.

PJ, who did you hang up on?

It was stupid man.

Stop calling Phishy stupid man. What did he want?

He’ll tell you when he calls you.

Then why isn’t my phone ringing?

That’s Phishy for you.

Phishy was my associate, slider, and gun dealer.

PJ’s phone rang again. It wasn’t Phishy, but I walked to the office’s waiting area with its geometric, purple couches around a glass table on a shimmering, neon powder-blue rug. The reception table held many more French fashion magazines than I was comfortable with. Where were my hovercar racing mags? Where was the reading material for my male clients who waited?

PJ was on her headset and brushed past me and dumped a stack of my hovercar racing magazines on the table. She returned to her desk. I made a disapproving sound as I bent down and arrayed all the magazines to be visually pleasing. I stood, admired my work, and nodded to myself. What was PJ doing with my hovercar racing magazines?

PJ was busy on the phone so I walked back to my private office. I eavesdropped as I passed by, but the conversation didn’t sound like a legitimate client. The man sounded like a window shopper. They came across the name of an agency on the Yellow Pages site. My agency sounded cool, so then they called to ask endless, inane questions about hiring a detective. But ultimately, they’d schedule no appointment at all. They’d call someone else.

The Good Kosher Man was right about that. Fame attracted all types. We had people who’d call to talk to me just because they saw me on TV or read about me on the newsfeed. PJ would, of course, tell them no! in that rude, French way she was so good at. Who said gatekeepers were bad? I had the best. They could waste her time, not mine.

I walked to my desk. She loved prioritizing my messages. I had the hot pile, the hold pile, the hell no pile, and a few other miscellaneous ones. I had her print them out because I didn’t like to deal with messages on my phone. I was old-fashioned that way; I wanted the paper. I could mark it up, take notes, and throw away when done. Probably was an OCD thing, but it worked for me and made me more efficient than constantly looking at my mobile to read them.

Cruz, PJ called out.

She didn’t yell, but her tone was a bit off.

What is it? I walked back out into the main office area.

Near the main door stood a middle-aged Asian man, in an expensive silk suit, staring at us.

Chapter Three

Echo, Samurai Master

H ow did you get in here? I asked.

You speak like children. Westerners banter much but say little, he said, not looking at me but gazing around the office.

I think I read that in a fortune cookie once, I said.

He locked his eyes on mine. I will walk from where I stand into your office. In your office I will slice your desk and every piece of furniture to pieces. I will leave and you will not see me again.

Why would you come to my office to cut it into pieces?

I come to see if you can stop me, Cruz-san.

If I do?

"Then we can talk further. We must see if you are